CNN news 2012-03-10 加文本

cnn news 2012-03-10

CARL AZUZ, HOST, cnn STUDENT NEWS: Fridays are awesome, and so are the Noels (ph) at Seminole High School in Florida, because one of you got our social media question of the week correct. All right. I`m Carl Azuz. Let`s get to today`s headlines.

Peaceful purposes or weapons? That is the constant debate over Iran`s controversial nuclear program. It`s been the source of tension between the Middle Eastern nation and other countries. And now Iran says it`s willing to restart talks about the program.

AZUZ (voice-over): At a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency yesterday, an Iranian official said it`s the start of a new chapter for his country and the IAEA. He also said Iran will, quote, "never suspend its nuclear activities."

The IAEA has been worried that Iran is trying to clean up signs of that nuclear activity. Some Western officials say these satellite photos might show that cleanup at work. Iran called any suspicions about this particular facility ridiculous.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: See if you can ID me. I`m a famous star who wants nothing to do with night life. I`m a major provider of light and heat. Not to be self-centered, but the whole world does revolve around me.

I`m the sun, and scientists estimate I`ve been around for billions of years.

AZUZ: Well, things are a little stormy up on the sun right now. There isn`t any rain or thunder there. It`s a solar storm that involves geomagnetic particles, and the sun doesn`t always keep those to itself.

AZUZ (voice-over): There were two solar flares earlier this week, and they sent those magnetic particles toward Earth. It takes light about eight minutes to travel the 92 million miles from the sun to the Earth.

The material from these flares got here at about 23 hours, so it was moving at 4 million miles per hour. These solar storms can sometimes cause problems for power grids here, for GPS. Scientists say that doesn`t seem to be happening right now.

AZUZ: Most Americans will be seeing more of the sun and maybe a little less sleep. Daylight Saving Time starts this Sunday when we move our clocks ahead one hour. We`ll move them back again one hour on November 4th.

AZUZ (voice-over): The idea is to reduce the amount of electricity that`s used by extending daylight hours. Ben Franklin came up with Daylight Saving Time in the 1700s. It was used for the first time in Great Britain during World War I. U.S. states don`t have to take part in Daylight Saving. Some of them don`t, but around 70 countries do move clocks forward in the spring.

AZUZ: Japan won`t be moving its clocks ahead on March 11th, but the nation will be marking a tragic milestone. It`ll be one year since a massive earthquake hit the island nation and triggered a tsunami, a giant ocean wave. Mark Biello was part of the cnn crew that went to Japan to cover this disaster. One year later, he looked back on his experience.

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MARK BIELLO, cnn PHOTOJOURNALIST: My name is Mark Biello. I`m a senior photojournalist and I`ve been working here at cnn for 28 years.

When we got to this disaster it was very challenging to cover because we didn`t have any kind of office or bureau to work out of. We were working out of the back of a van. We had a generator. It was bitter cold at times.

The infrastructure was completely shot, and we had many challenges trying to feed and do live shots with our systems and do coverage of these different villages that were destroyed.

One of the first towns we traveled to was Minamisanriku. When we first arrived, the level of destruction was incredible. Basically a small fishing village that was completely destroyed. It was heartbreaking to think that how many people could be buried under this rubble.

And there was always the threat of aftershocks. There were aftershocks that happened that rocked the van. It would -- you could feel under our feet, or while we were editing or broadcasting their live shots. There were some other tsunami warnings in the days after. So the sirens would go off and the Japanese defense forces and the Japanese fire and rescue, they were very much on edge, very stressed.

You know, they were trying to keep us safe, too, so they would come down, you know, just screaming and yelling, "Tsunami, tsunami," and so we had to listen and get to higher ground.

Another town that we were sent to was Hachinohe. What was amazing about what happened with the tsunami there, the tsunami wave actually picked up giant freighters, and they were mostly fishing trawlers, and tossed them on their side like little toy boats, and also picked some of the ships up and took them into the city. It was just a very surreal scene.

Well, it`s been a year since the tsunami. I think about Japan constantly. I think about the people, how they`re getting by. At some point, it would be great to go back and cover this again, to see the rebuilding process.